Like Robinson Crusoe...as primitive as can be

I'M ON A BOAT!

Today we had arranged to go on a day cruise to Treasure Island resort. We woke up bright and early to catch the charter to Denaurau port. We boarded the ship at the port and took off toward open sea. After cruising for about an hour and making a couple of stops at other islands, we finally came upon Treasure Island. Only 15 passengers were allowed ashore, so there was one couple tagging along with us. There is an overnight resort on the island, a pool, restaurant, mini golf course and a turtle pond. As we made our way onto the island, we were greeted by a song from the employees of the resort.

Being welcomed ashore!

paradise

Our tropical Isle...

We grabbed spots near the beautiful infinity pool and took off to explore the island. We found that the resorts were made of around 60 little individual bungalows (Fijian bures) scattered throughout the island. Each bure had a hammock hung outside. Dad immediately was excited about the idea. We made our way around to the turtle pond and watched the 10 or 15 sea turtles who live in the enclosure. As we made our way back to the pool, Dad took off to see if he could swing a deal with the resort to stay for a night. When he returned we found out that they had room for us, so everyone set about deciding if they would stay or not. The main problem was that everyone had only brought enough stuff for the day trip, not overnight! All we had were the clothes on our backs. We floated in the infinity pool for a while, thinking it over and then it was time for lunch. We had a delicious BBQ buffet. It was some of the best food we've had here! After pigging out, it was time to decide if we wanted to stay or not. Lindsay, Mom and I first checked out the rooms and found them surprisingly luxurious. They had two beds, a private bathroom, sliding glass doors that overlooked the beach and even an air conditioner. Mom, Dad, Katlyn, Robb and I decided we were staying and everyone else was headed back to the mainland.

Crush and Squirt

Our beautiful Bure

PASSED. OUT.

Lunch time!!

Before everyone left, Mom, Katlyn, Robb and I decided to play in the mini golf tournament with Alyssa. We met at hole 1 and were off. We squeezed in the last hole right before she had to leave with the gang. Yes…Katlyn beat all of us but at least I beat Robb :) 

Where does the pool end and the ocean begin??

Alyssa is amused rather than concerned

BULA!!

Headin back to Va and the swim up bar...

We sat on the rock wall on the beach and watched everyone else off. After their boat took off we headed back to the room to get changed. There was a group going over to Bounty Island for a church service and Dad had asked if it would be okay if we tagged along just to check out the island. Having no clothes other than the ones on our backs, we dropped our bags off in the room and headed out to the tender boat. From the tender boat we transferred to a faster speedboat which brought people from the other island close to us, Beachcomber. We sped through the water and about 15 minutes later made it to Bounty Island.  

Bounty Island

We began our exploration of Bounty Island. It seemed to be about the same size as our island. Apparently there was a British reality show filmed there called “Celebrity Love Island”. Yea…sounds like a winner. So I guess that’s a big draw for people to come visit here. There was a small path that took us through the jungle part of the island and there were fruit bats everywhere. Thankfully, we saw the bures on this island and they were ghetto compared to ours! HOLLA!!! After reaching the dead end on the each we decided to head back and grab a drink before we had to leave. We headed to the bar and grab drinks and sat out by the pool. It was much darker out here but you can see the mainland off in the distance. It seems like you are so far out here when you are on these islands; like you are in a whole different country, but when you look, the main island seems very close. We walked along the beach and found an abandoned boat so of course we had to take a couple of shots. Then we headed back to wait for the service to end. And we waited… and waited…

We would make an awesome pirate gang.

When the church service ended we all made our way out to the boats and headed off to our island. We were all starving since we had expected to be back at Treasure Island for dinner at 7. At 8, we pulled up to the island and headed off to the restaurant. We had a wonderful dinner and were entertained by the employees who sing in the church choir. They were all of the people who had tendered over with us! Their singing was beautiful and seemed effortless. They had beautiful harmonies and though I couldn’t understand words, the emotions were beautiful. The music here in Fiji has been amazing. You can tell that it is something that they treasure; a real part of their culture. I imagine that there is singing at every major event and have yet to come across someone here who doesn’t have a beautiful voice or who cant harmonize on the spot. It is truly amazing.

As you can see our clothes were not church appropriate.

After our dinner, we made our way back to our bures. It was very quiet and you could hear the waves as we walked along. We made it back, showered and passed out in our beds. It was a long and adventurous day but definitely one of our most memorable in Fiji

Headin to the coast

Sorry for the lack of posts readers. I have been playing catchup with the entries but we have been without Internet access. So now...catchup time.

Today we had decided to head out to the Coral Coast. It is located on the south side of the main island of Fiji, so about an hour drive from the resort. Dad, Uncle George, Lisa, Grandma, Grandpa, Lindsay and Alyssa and I all decided to go on this little adventure so we headed off around midday. The drive to the coast was beautiful. We went through a bunch of different types of terrain, ranging from farmland to more forest. It was beautiful. Lindsay, Alyssa and I had all of the windows open in the back and we watched Fiji pass us by with the wind in our faces.

When we finally turned off of Queen's Road and made our way toward the beach. After getting a little lost, we turned off on this small, dirt road in the middle of nowhere. We were passing tiny villages and farmland when all of a sudden we came upon a rickety bridge. Everyone was a little nervous but like Indiana Jones, Uncle George made it across no problem.


Can't you just hear the Indy music???

We finally made it to Natadola Beach and parked the car. The beach was beautiful. with soft, almost white sand and crystal clear water. We were told that it is ranked the #7 best beach in the world. We walked along the beach until we came upon the Intercontinental Hotel. Man oh man, it was like coming upon an oasis. It was beautiful; very posh. We walked around in awe and finally found the restaurant. We had a delicious lunch and talked to some of the employees and found out the resort was only opened 2 moths ago. Next door was a golf course designed by Vijay Singh, a famous Fijian golf player. After lunch , we lounged around the infinite pool and walked down the beach until we decided to head out. We stopped for a drink in a little bar and then went to fetch the "limo".


A little piece of Heaven


the 7th best beach in the world

Now while at the resort I had joked that hopefully the car didn't start so we would be forced to stay at the resort. Well as luck would have it, Uncle George got in and the car wouldn't start. It seemed to be a dead battery and luckily we had grease monkey Jeff with us. He found that a battery cable was disconnected and that had been our problem the whole time. He fixed it and we were off.


A Fijian sunset

We got back in time to watch the nightly serenade and torch lighting. After that Dad, Mom, Katlyn, Robb and I headed back to the Hard Rock Cafe for another dinner.

A day of recovery

This morning Katlyn, Robb, Brandon and I had arranged to attend a sales presentation put on by the resort. We all had to pretend we were 25 years old and made >$55,000 a year to qualify. In return we would get $50 in Resort credits and Dad would get a 1,000 extra vacation points each. We made our way to the sales center bright and early. After filling out the necessary paperwork we met with salespeople who in turn made their sales pitch and heard us answer with "no. no. no" over and over again. Katlyn and Robb made up their own version of reality. Robb had just finished med school and was beginning his residency. He had $200K in Student loan debt and Katlyn was beginning her first year of dental school. They played them like a fiddle. Brandon just seemed to be sleeping through his whole presentation having chaperoned Dad's shenanigans all night long. After and hour and a half of trying, they gave up and gave us our credit and let us on our way.

We headed to the pool to lay out for a while and had lunch at the restaurant here at the resort. We took our places back in our lounge chairs, read and soaked up the rays. Dad was a hit (I guess you could say) around the resort. Everyone seems to know his name now, or perhaps they just recognize his stumbling. His foot is very sore and he is unsure why. Security told him "You're the man". Dad maintains he said this in a proud and excited voice. I believe it to be accusatory, like "You're the one who pulled me out of my effing nap to pull out of the pool. You were naked for god's sake". After crisping ourselves we headed in to get changed. Lisa, Mom and I had heard that the resort was going to be holding frog races tonight and left our rooms in a frenzy, ready to see some frogs. We made our way out poolside where the employees had drawn a circle in chalk on the pool deck. Each frog was tied with a ribbon with a country's flag attached. Each frog was then auctioned off. A third of the proceeds were donated to the Nadi children's hospital. Mom bid on the American frog (Carl Lewis) but was sadly outbid by a group of twentysomethings from LA.




About to begin, the frogs are under that box...



The races were to take place in 2 heats with the top three frogs to exit the circle moving on to the final round. For the first heat, Charlie took the six frogs to the center of the circle and let them go. None of the frogs did a thing. They just sat there. Finally three made it out of the circle and the next heat began. History repeated itself with the second heat and finals, with the frogs sitting for about a minute until one of them took off jumping. It was quite gimmicky and I can imagine the employees sitting around and laughing at the crazy tourists but it was fun nonetheless.



This may or may not be five minutes later...still sitting.

Mom had decided to treat us all to dinner at the port tonight so we packed up the "limo" and headed off. We decided to eat at the Hard Rock Cafe. Everyone was pretty excited to have what we expected to be close to American food. The food was excellent but the service is another story. I know to expect it to be different than the US. We are spoiled by the food service industry in the States. But in Fiji it is another story. Uncle George's meal was completely forgotten, all of our food came out cold and refills were the things of dreams. They give a whole new meaning to the term "Fiji time". Everyone enjoyed their meals though (with the exception of Uncle George who still maintains that he wasn't hungry) and we headed to bed with our bellies full of food and our heads full of good 'ole American Rock and Roll.



WE ARE AMERICAN




YOU STILL OWE US A CHEESEBURGER, SUCKAS!!! I'LL REMEMBER THIS CLAPTON!


Before heading to bed we stayed up to reminisce about Jeff's crazy adventure some more with the help of Bman's winning narrative, now with charades. I have to admit that he does a wicked "drunk Jeff Maillo" impression. In the midst of all this fun, who should call on the telephone but Sam, the New Zealand kid. He and his friends wanted to invite Dad to continue the fun they began the night before. Dad smartly told him that he was already in bed for the night but promised to catch up with them the next day. Who knows the escapades they got into without Dad but one can only expect that nothing will top a midnight skinny dip with one Jeff Maillo. Katlyn sang us all to sleep with a rousing chorus of "Maggie" by Rod Stewart; a lulaby of sorts...

Maggie...I've got somethin to say to you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ATTN: Content in today's blog is rated PG-13 for public intoxication and overall stupidity.

The morning started out like most others. Relaxing and blogging (in my case). Dad, Katlyn, Robb, Grandma and Grandpa walked down to a little coffee shop not far from the resort. When Mom and I got up we headed to the coffee shop with Brandon. We had delicious blueberry muffins and Fiji water. Yes, the same Fiji water that costs $4 a bottle in the us is $1.25 here.

Today we had decided to head into Nadi (pronounced Nandhi) to check out the town and show everyone else the market we had visited the day before. All of us (sans Bman and Lindsay) piled into the "limo" and took off. We parked the limo and began roaming the streets. Quite a sight, 10 American tourists taking up the sidewalk. So we decided to split up. Uncle George, Lisa and Alyssa headed one way and the rest of us headed toward a temple. While passing a shop Grandpa found a tank top he really liked, so we stepped in the shop. As we were entering a guy called out to Robb. Robb stayed behind despite my crazy "watch out and don't wander off alone in a foreign country" eyes and started talking to the guy. The dude explained that the shop we were perusing was an Indian shop, not a Fijian. There is a huge Indian population in Fiji and there are visible tensions between the races, but for the most part they live cohesively. So this man told us that he would show us to his shop. Dad took off with him with all of us in tow and he headed toward his shop. He took us inside and headed toward the back. I noticed the Kava bowl and my mind flashed to the tourism book I had just been reading in the car. Dad and Robb quickly put there shoes back on and we high tailed it out of there. I had been warned that people would attempt to have us drink kava with them, only to expect payment later.

Downtown Nadi

With that scam behind us, we headed to the Nadi handicraft market. It consisted of about 25 stalls with locals selling their wares inside. Most of them looked exactly the same, and here the racial tensions seemed apparent as well, with all of the Indian vendors setting up shop next to each other and the Fijians in a different section. After browsing and lightening our purses we headed toward the Sri Siva Subramaniya Temple toward the end of downtown Nadi where Uncle George, Lisa and Alyssa met us.

The handicraft Market

The temple is said to be the largest Hindu temple in the Southern Hemisphere. It is the most colorful building you have ever seen and is the biggest landmark in Nadi. We walked up to the temple, removed our shoes and headed to the kiosk to pay our entrance fee. We began to explore the temple. There were several smaller shrines with one larger shrine in the middle. Every ceiling was covered with elaborate and colorful paintings. They were truly beautiful. Despite being warned not to take pictures inside the temple, the management didn't realize that this was Jeffrey Maillo they were dealing with. For the 496th time, Jeffrey was caught breaking the rules and was chastised by the docent.

The back of the temple

In front of the temple

The ceiling

After the verbal lashing directed at Dad, the docent offered to give us a tour of the temple. He took us to each shrine explaining who the shrine was worshipping and the different forms of prayer that take place at each shrine. He even showed us the machine that calls everyone to prayer time that was donated by a local man from Nadi. After a few pictures, we took off in search of food. On a detour from food, we took a stroll through the local market showing Grandma and Grandpa the colorful and fragrant produce. Dad ate a small pepper on a dare and it burned his mouth off. You'd think that it would affect his speech but no such luck.

The gang outside of the market

We headed to a coffee shop called Bulaccino that we had heard good things about. There, we had a delicious lunch and Alyssa and I even had the special treat of a PINK CUPCAKE. It was no Sprinkles or Magnolia...but it'll do. We hobbled our way back to the car (after a stop at the supermarket to restock our TimTams [a delicious Aussie cookie] for the room) and headed back to the resort.

We returned around 4pm, changed quickly and headed out to the pool. We spent the rest of the time relaxing, reading and enjoying the sunset. We were serenaded and even played a round of "Name That Tune". We ordered drinks from Va, our favorite bartender and when dad asked her to surprise him she brought him a "Jeff's Special"...uh oh. When the sun was down we headed back to our rooms to freshen up then came back out for Happy Hour, or in Dad's case to watch "Beverly Hills Chihuahua", the outdoor movie for the night.

Happy Hour is when things started to get a little crazy. I was in the midst of one of the worst allergy attacks of my life, so I must admit that my recollections of the night are fairly limited. Dad and Uncle George started drinking Rum and Cokes and it all went downhill from there. Brandon and I attempted to drink along with them but fell by the wayside. Meanwhile, at the table next to us a group of about 6 kids from New Zealand were drinking and...get this...playing Acoustic guitar. Even in Fiji you can't escape it. You've seen the guy before, probably at a bonfire in Santa Cruz, who whips out his acoustic guitar and in between sips of Keystone Light he plays the three or four songs he knows....you've seen that guy, you know that guy, you may even be that guy...that guy.

It's kind of dark but you can see Jeff on the right, talking to that guy with the guitar

So a few Rum & Cokes later and the next thing I know, Jeffrey is over talking to these kids. They're asking what his favorite music is and he says with a pondering swagger "umm probably Eric Clapton" when one of the girls says [NZ accent] "OH PLAY THAT 'LOLA' SONG!!!"

...

...

yep, that guy. I mean Cheese & Rice the song is called "Layla", it's in commercials and movies for god's sake. THE TITLE OF THE FRIGGIN SONG IS IN THE LYRICS!! After that snafu, Dad requests "Hotel California" and they couldn't even finish the first verse...c'mon Acoustic guitar guy! Change my mind! Don't be THAT GUY! After they headed off to the bar to take a shot I headed to bed to try and regain my nasal passages. So....for the rest of the story I have to take the word of the only survivor and witness....Bman.

It's like watching a car crash.

According to the Bman one shot followed another until Jeffrey was headed into a drunken oblivion. Every shot imaginable: vodka, tequila, rum...you name it, they drank it. So now at this point Jeff is pretty much falling over drunk. He attempts to buy a whole bottle of alcohol when Va, our favorite bartender, proceeds to cut him off. It was a $170 bottle of alcohol since they would charge him by "the nip". The kiwis are still hanging in there and are still smartly encouraging Jeff to drink some more. Va, still was passing drinks his way so the trip to Hangoverville continued. Jeffrey gave them a crash course on "American truck driver" vernacular and had them all saying things that made children and elderly women run for cover. At this point, Sam (one of the Kiwis who has a Rod Stewart like platinum blond haircut) suggests a skinny dipping fest;. Never the one to let opportunity pass, Jeff proceeds to remove his clothing and head into the pool. Literally. He misses a step and the ledge and falls into about a foot of water. See, the pool kind of gradually slopes down from the sidewalk, like the beach would. Before Bman could throw the life preserver, Security showed up and asked them to put their clothes back on and to please leave. Jeff proceeds to put his bathing suit on backwards, therefore necessitating the removal of said bathing suit just to right it.

Dad with Rod Stewart!! I mean...Sam.

Now is the part where my memory comes back in. I wake up to a pounding at the sliding glass door and St. Bman is holding my dad up with empty bottle in hand, cigarette dangling precariously from his lip. He walks him into the house and attempts to get him to bed. But, no no dear reader. Jeff will not go to bed. He wants to "stay up and party" (actual quote). The problem is now in Mom's hands as St Bman has gone home probably to volunteer with sick children or help old ladies cross the street. Mom, having experience with this creature of the drink, came out mid-sleep and tried to get him to get into bed. She entered the room, yelling "Why is your body wet, but not your shorts? GET INTO BED". But the beast could not be reasoned with. He wandered out the bedroom sliding door and onto the grass between the bungalows where he stumbled around for a few seconds and then fell over his own feet. He claims a ditch is responsible but the jury is still out. She finally reeled him back into bed and retired back to her own room. Several seconds later, Katlyn and Robb (who are sleeping on the Murphy bed in the living room) paralyzed with fear, hear the shuffle of his zombie feet and feign sleep. Yet again, Brenda must come to the rescue and with the experience of Steve Irwin must wrestle this unruly creature back to whence it came. With baited breath the inhabitants of F104 slowly drifted back into a restful slumber.

I am writing this the morning after and this morning Jeffrey is a sight. I'm fairly sure he is still intoxicated and he is limping around the resort. He has scrapes on both of his knees and has hurt his right foot. Did he party too hard? You be the judge...because Jeffrey is paying the price.

The Real Fiji

The day started out by the pool. Everyone relaxed and swam (I know...crazy right?) We had lunch by the pool in the restaurant. At about 2 Dad came in to take a phone call from Asinate about that night. See, Dad had emailed someone from the resort prior to us coming about making sure that our rooms had ocean views. Being Jeff Maillo, he asked the woman, Asinate, if there was anything from the US we might be able to bring her that perhaps is difficult to get over here. Asinate replied that she ran a small store here and asked us to bring cartons of Benson & Hedges cigarettes and some booze. So we scoured the bay area for the cigarettes and ended up buying more and the booze in duty free at the airport. On our first day here, Asinate came by to pick them up and in return invited us to her village to have dinner. There, now that we are all caught up we're back to dad being on the phone with her. Asinate called and we decided to meet at Jack's, a small handicraft shop in the downtown at 6:30. Then we would follow her to her village.

We were all a little nervous about heading to her village. We didn't really know what to expect, what to wear or how to act. Everything in our tour books regarding village visits seemed to be regarding toursity type village visits. Would Asinate really live in a "village"? Or is that just what they call neighborhood here? What should we bring? How should we dress? After consulting with a guy here Dad and Uncle George decided that we would pick up some Kava root to bring with us. So Dad, Uncle George, Brandon, Katlyn, Robb and I headed into Nadi to visit the market.

After parking the "limo" and navigating the parking meters here we headed off in the direction of the market. The market reminded me a lot of the Pisac market in Peru. There were tons of different stalls with independent vendors selling their goods. We made our way to the back of the market, looking for a large bald guy that we had been advised to visit for good Kava. We stopped by the fish market to see what they had to offer. We finally spotted our guy and bought a kilo of Kava.

Look at all that kava! The root is then ground down and strained with water.

We made our way back to the resort and got ready to go to Asinate's. We headed to Jack's and waited. Asinate was on Fiji time and showed up about 10 minutes late. We followed her taxi out past town and through the dark. We finally past a sign that said "Korovuto Village" and we pulled in. Asinate's village is basically a collection of small houses. She welcomed us onto the porch where we removed our shoes and sat on a mat and she introduced us to her husband Charlie. Charlie then began preparing the Kava. After preparing the Kava and passing the bowl around we took a walk around the village. There were several little kids hanging out with us and one that I especially started hanging out with. We bonded over our mutual love of Spiderman and we hopped around the village on one foot, seeing who could last the longest. Asinate showed us her church and told us about everyone who lives in the village. There are 3 different clans who live the village together, with about 200 people. She introduced us to her mother and father and then we made our way back to her house. We sat outside drinking some more kava and she introduced us to her cousin, Junior. Junior was a lively guy who was very funny. He told us about living in Fiji, how he wants to travel around but has never left Fiji and about how what we were to experience tonight was the real Fiji.

Asinate's family is Methodist and attend this church right in her village.

Meeting Asinate's Parents.

Grandpa with his bestie, Junior.

Asinate introduced us to her sister and her niece who helped make all the food for dinner. Then she invited us inside. The girls went inside while the boys stayed out to drink some more Kava. Inside, Asinate had prepared a feast and it was spread out on a beautiful blanket on the ground. We took our seats around the blanket and Asinate's sister began telling us what everything was. She had made fresh fried fish, boiled fish with coconut milk, taro and cassava root, chicken roasted in a lovo, chicken chop suey, corned beef wrapped in taro leaves fresh fruit, crabs in a half shell and a coconut slaw. We all filled our plates, trying new things (even Robb!) and filling ourselves. She had even set up a special table for Grandma and Grandpa. They served us fresh squeezed lemon juice. Throughout dinner we chatted about the food, or in the case of Asinate's niece, about Hannah Montana and the Disney Channel. They only get it every Sunday.

The spread!

Ready to eat with Asinate

The whole gang. Asinate's sister is in the gold dress.

Push Pops!

After we had eaten the boys came in and pigged out. The food was delicious and truly authentic. After dinner we headed out onto the porch for some more kava and just talking to each other. Junior told us about how he was going to be a movie star and be "the new Drew Carey show". He said he would come to America, to Hollywood and Grandpa would have to drive him around in a limo while he sipped champagne in the back. They taught us about their traditions. Women should cover their shoulders and knees when in the village. The men stay living in the village with their families but the women move with their husbands. The kids can be given small amounts of kava but aren't allowed to drink Kava officially until they are 16. The men and women are buried in the cemetery separately. After many more rounds of "low tide" (only filled half way) Kava they sang their farewell song, Isa Lei, to us. After hugging everyone and thanking them for everything we piled back in the van and headed home. It was such a special experience that none of us will ever forget.

A relaxing Fiji Day

We all slept soundly after returning from the cruise. A couple of us still felt like we were on the boat, rockin and rollin but everyone adjusted back to land just fine. Dad got up bright and early and walked down to a market that we hadn't visited before. He hit the mother load. He came back with rolls and bread galore, pastrami and he even found some chorizo. Holla!


you can spy the swim up bar in the distance

We headed out to the pool today and staked our spots. Alyssa spent the morning with the kids club here at the resort and they fed fish and swam together. I spent my day camped out in the partial shade with my book. I'm just loving this book so its been really hard to tear me away from it (yea I know...not so hard to believe but still).We all worked on our tans, swam a bit and visited the swim up bar quite a few times throughout the day. We think the bartender at the swim up bar, Va, is pretty taken with Dad. She always asks where he is.


the kiddy pool...where Alyssa tried to pull my bathing suit bottoms off....cool.

We had lunch at the restaurant here on the resort property. The food was pretty good. Its mostly touristy food that they know Americans and Australians will buy but that works just fine for me. We stayed out there until I was sure that my skin was gonna burn off. Then we headed inside to freshen up before dinner, or in me and dad's case head to the computer room to catch up with the blog.


dinner on the patio

After our hard work at the keyboard (right...) we headed over to grandma's for cocktails. We sat on her back patio and watched the Fiji sunset. It really was beautiful. Every night around 6 pm, a guy runs around and lights all of the torches along the beach and around the resort. Then a group of Fijian men walk around with a guitar serenading all of the guests. It really is a great wait to end everyday.


The whole clan

After the serenade we started BBQing. There are several communal BBqs around the resort so we had decided that we would BBQ a feast for all of us. We BBQed the meat we had picked up at the meat market the previous day and the fish we bought at the wharf. We had corn, baked potatoes, rice, rolls and the chorizo. It was quite a feast and exceptionally delicious. Grandma still believes that no one ate better than us in the entire resort. We meandered back to our respective places and got ready for bed. Personally, my book was calling to me yet again so I spent a couple of hours reading. A perfect ending to a relaxing Fijian day!

Bula!

Day 3: Isa Lei Yasawa Islands

Our last day started with another great breakfast from the crew. I was feeling a little under the weather but nothing serious. We spent the morning cruising to our next island stop. We took a group photo with 75.3 billion cameras belonging to all of the passengers. We were set to visit the other side of the first island we went to. Once we arrived we tendered out to a deserted beach. We laid out our sunbathing mats and headed into the water. Robb of course was distracted with the plethora of hermit crabs on the beach. We headed out into the water and basically didn't stop. It was so shallow; it never reached past our waists. Uncle George and Lisa headed out to another snorkeling trip with some of the other passengers.



Breakfast with Oni...our favorite deckhand!

Who wouldn't want to spend the day here?!

We enjoyed the warm water for a while. The water seems to be extra salty here and it makes you a little more buoyant. Grandma, Grandpa, Dad, Mom, Katlyn, Robb and I decided to take a walk down the beach. We headed down away from everyone and after about 15 minutes of walking we came across a little village. Dad struck up a conversation with two women who were weaving a new mat out of palm for their home. He asked if it would be okay to check out their village and they invited us in. This was so different from the village we visited. It was more apparent of their everyday life. They were cooking some yams and everyone who passed welcomed us with a "Bula". Most of the houses were aluminum siding with some cinder block. There weren't many doors or windows, but when I glanced inside I would see the occasional TV or stereo. They must have been run off of generators because we didn't notice any power and they were cooking with fire. After walking around the village we decided to return to the beach. We walked back just as the snorkeling group returned. We had 10 more minutes to enjoy the water and then it was time to tender back to the boat.

The village

cooking yams


Thurston Howell and his wife...where's the professor?

We returned to the boat, showered and finished packing up our stuff. We relaxed on deck before having lunch (delicious as usual). We enjoyed our last lunch on the boat and cruised for the next couple of hours. While we traveled the crew was constantly fishing off the back of the boat. The crew caught one on our way in, only to lose it right before getting it in the boat. bummer. Before leaving, the crew came around to thank all of us and shake our hands. They finished by singing the farewell song, "Isa Lei".

So shallow!




Who let this blind guy wander off without supervision? He's obviously injured!

We docked, and boarded the boat to head back to the lounge. We returned and thankfully (?) the "limo" was still there in one piece. Uncle George fired her up (after the third time) and we all piled in and headed off. Grandma had said that she wanted to buy some fish while we were there so we stopped at a small meat market. We bought steaks (different from what you would get at home...) and chicken but were told that we should head to the dock for fish.

We headed to the wharf and were met by local fisherman with today's catch strung up and displayed in front of them. There were eels and pufferfish there next to red snapper and various other fish. Uncle George ended up buying a couple of snapper and wrapping it in a plastic bag mom had and we were off. Nothing like fresh fish poorly wrapped in an outdated van for an hour long drive home. yum.

With our fish laying on cardboard next to our raw meat we headed home. But when we passed the ultimate temptation on the way home, we had to stop: McDonalds. Yes, dear reader we succumbed to our American Capitalist pig roots. And it was EFFING DELICIOUS. It tasted more similar to the McD's at home than the one we had in Peru. The drive thru sign says "Bula" and when you leave it says "Vinaka" (thank you). Dad even spotted some fruit bats the size of pigeons in the parking lot.

I knew we'd run into someone here!

We headed home, and made it back to the resort safely. As we were unloading everything, Grandpa dropped the fish in the parking lot of the resort. More flavoring I guess. We unpacked from our wonderful cruise and hit the hay. It is nice to be back at the resort but the cruise is sure to be one of the highlights of the trip :)

why are we pointing up? my guess is as good as yours...but we do as we're told.